Womblife

John Fahey's 1997 album on Table Of The Elements -


John Fahey - Womblife (Full Album)

TRACKLIST:

01. Sharks - 0:00
02. Planaria - 9:20
03. Eels - 19:14
04. Coelacanths - 25:28
05. Juana - 33:01

Good Morning

A Countertenor Morning

In the October issue of Wire magazine, 1995, Biba Kopf did an article on countertenors due to a film from France released as a dramatic story on the baroque castrato Farinelli. So here for your delectation from the list of CD recommendations are some modern-day countertenors -

Pergolesi - Salve Regina in C Minor: I. Salve Regina (Michael Chance)

Thomas Campion - The Cypress Curtain of the Night Is Spread

Henry Purcell - Sweeter Than Roses

Johann Nauwach - Jetztund kömpt die Nacht herbey

finally a song from that film about Farinelli

George Frideric Handel - Cara Sposa

ENJOY

More Countertenor Choices

More baroque bifurcations - and a couple of moderns. For sallymn.

Henry Purcell - Sound The Trumpet

Here we have James Bowman (at right) - the charismatic doyen of modern countertenors - alongside Michael Chance, one of Bowman's many protégés. In this recording, they sing Purcell's famous duet in a manner that says it all about vocal skill, communication, and mutual respect.

Georg Friedrich Händel - Arias from "Admeto, Re di Tessaglia"

From the Opera "Admeto, Re di Tessaglia"
Trasimede, the Prince and brother of Admeto.
00:02​ - Se l' arco avessi, e i strali
06:14​ - Da te piu tosto partir vogl'io
James Bowman - countertenor
IL Complesso Barocco - Alan Curtis

More modern now - right up to date is the minmalist music of michael nyman -

Michael Nyman - If

Iestyn Davies and viol consort Fretwork

Michael Nyman - The Self-Laudatory Hymn of Inanna and her Omnipotence

ENJPY

Something Wired - Farinelli Etc

Handel / Rinaldo - Farinelli Il Castrato (1994) - Lascia Ch'io Pianga

In the absence of any living castrato to fill the lead role in the film, Farinelli's reputedly astonishing range and power has been recreated for the film by the Paris-based IRCAM electronics laboratory. By overlapping the voices of the American countertenor Derek Lee Ragin and the Polish soprano Ewa Mallas-Godlewska, and then morphing them into a single entity, IRCAM - the electronic institute created by Pierre Boulez - has created a Cybercastrato for the end of the 20th century. Synched to the sensuous lips of the Farinelli character, - played by Stefano Dionisi and posed by the filmmakers as a flamboyant glam savage cross between Freddie Mercury and a dandified Blixa Bargeld (of Einsturzende Neubauten) , it's easy to see how the great castrati singers became the pop idols of their day: they made nuns and maidens swoon, while the sheer beauty of their voices precipitated Ii male listeners all manner of anxieties, and prompted predictable insults. God-like their voices might have been, but the castrati's audiences were also there to gape at the outsize, caponesque geeks producing such heavenly sounds. Alternately ridiculed and exalted, the ambivalent response to the great castrato singers fixed the pattern for all high male singers to come. And not only in the public mind: contemporary composers continue to cast male altos and countertenors the castrato singers' natural, undoctored successors -as either gods or monsters. "I would love it if someday if a guy would write us a part that wasn't totally off the wall," dreams The Hilliard Ensemble's countertenor David James, "a part where I'll maybe get to do a love duet with a soprano."

Philippe de Monte - Parce Mihi, Domine (Motette zu 6 Stimmen)

Proving once again  that Wire covers more genres than any other monthly magazine.

For sallymn

ENJOY

Einstürzende Neubauten

Talking of that German band -


Einstürzende Neubauten - The Garden

Einstürzende Neubauten - Blume [English Version]

Einstürzende Neubauten - Z.N.S.

ENJOY

The Friday Five

1. What’s the weather outside your window doing right now? If that’s not inspiring, what’s the weather like somewhere you wish you could be?

2. What’s for breakfast? Lunch? Dinner?

3. What are things you can’t go without?

4. How did your parents choose your name?

5. If you could travel back in time, where and when would you go?

Music To Slide You Towards Midnight Gently

My ambient mix of tunes -

Harold Budd & Brian Eno - First Light

Biosphere - Angel's Flight

William Basinski - Tear Vial

Mary Lattimore - Til A Mermaid Drags You Under

Bark Psychosis - Pendulum Man

ENJOY